Short Summary

Arab representatives in Karachi negotiated throughout Sunday (3 February 1974) with three armed guerrillas who has hijacked the Greek freighter "Vori" in the cit's harbour two days earlier.

Description

Arab representatives in Karachi negotiated throughout Sunday (3 February 1974) with three armed guerrillas who has hijacked the Greek freighter "Vori" in the cit's harbour two days earlier. The assailants were demanding the release of two Palestinians sentenced to death last month in Greece for their part in the Athens Airport attack of August 1973, in which five people died. Unless the Palestinians were given free passage out of Greece, the guerrillas has threatened to kill two sailors they were holding hostage and to blow up the ship.

Representatives of the Palestine Liberation Organization stationed in Karachi came aboard the "Vori" on Sunday to attempt to persuade the guerrillas to release their hostages. This mission was followed by a delegation comprising the ambassadors to Pakistan of Syria. Egypt and Lebanon, who had flown in especially from Islamabad. Following two meetings with the ambassadors, and more than 30 hours after they had seized the ship, the querrillas disembarked and boarded and boarded a plane, apparently for an Arab destination.

One of the hostages said later that they left under the misapprehension that Greek Government was releasing the two Black September prisoners. In fact, the only concession from Athens had been to commute the death sentences and this move had already been rejected by the guerrillas as inadequate.

No clve was given to the identity, or even the nationality, of the hijackers, who claimed to be members of a group called the "Moslem International Guerrillas" (MIG). Officials did not rule out the possibility that at least one of them was a Pakistani. They had been armed with automatic pistols and five small plastic bombs.